


Waking Cain

by Argyle



Category: Demian - Hermann Hesse
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-03-23
Updated: 2004-03-23
Packaged: 2018-02-20 11:02:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2426366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Argyle/pseuds/Argyle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fire worship was by no means the most foolish thing ever invented.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Waking Cain

Demian's form felt slight beside me as his shoulder pressed lightly against my own. I felt the warmth of the fire as it passed into him, through him, imagining the pale glimmer of his skin that lay just out of reach beneath the thin cotton folds of his shirt.

I shifted, positioning my hand below my chin, and let my gaze settle onto the writhing mass of flames before me. Quiet minutes tumbled into each other, the beating of my heart and the branching pulsation of my thoughts matching the flickering dialogue of the fire. Forms stirred against each other, two figures together as one and again falling apart, spent but for the movement of their languidly golden arms and the peculiar slant of their mouths. Falling now, the motions were changing as the heat upon my cheeks. There were aeroplanes, flickers of ash reeling before the gray width of the grill, clutching their steel wings inward and heralding the storm of humanity that appeared in their wake, now lingering on the underlying knobs of resin-stained wood.

I felt the throbbing soul of Europe within me as it began to awake from its slumber of millennia passed. Again there was a motion of limbs, escaping only into the mound of cinders. The outcome of worlds was livid to my eyes. Scattered lines of figures emerged, gangly and sanguine, now with heads of wolves and the arching glare of hawks. I swallowed, straining to hear their whispers, their haggard promises of eternity. I saw myself, a form reverberating and a flash of flame as a dab of pine-tar ignited before the hearth.

My fingers clutched against my heart, I stirred at last. I raised my shoulders, moving my chest to the cool tiles of the floor. I listened to the rain for a moment, memorizing its instantaneous laughter as it fell upon the windowpane and longing for its phantom caress against the flushed curve of my cheeks.

"Did you see?" I asked at last, turning my view toward my friend.

He slowly lifted his head, shifting his form. Our eyes met and he nodded almost imperceptibly, his features still and his lips lightly parted. There was somehow a sadness that then seeped from behind his dark lashes, catching at the crease of his gaze. I felt his shoulder move against me as he reached forward, taking my hand. Demian's touch was cool, though his fingers were firm upon my own and his pulse was steady as he gently squeezed my hand. I blinked, opening my mouth to speak as I saw him turn his attention back to the fire. I glanced to it, the sparks undiminished by the passage of time, and back to Demian. I held his hand with both of my own. Perhaps I thought to warm his icy fingers; perhaps I wished to lessen the distance between us through the passage of the night.

"Demian, I... thank you," I breathed, my voice lost against the crackling of the grate.

But he was already gone, receded within himself. The answering sparks that shone against the glass of his eyes were merely reflections of the fire and the fates that loomed on the curve of dawn's light.


End file.
